From Gillian Tett to Mervyn King the voices of WISDOM and REASON now challenge the vast majority of the national and international finance industry to stand up and be counted by those who provide the means by which their casino gambling is funded.

An analysis by the Bipartisan Policy Center in Washington estimates these measures will be exhausted sometime during the last two weeks of February. If Congress has not agreed to raise the debt ceiling by then, the US government will have to decide which of its financial obligations to meet and which, well, not to.

CAN ONE come to any other conclusion than that which describes the elite leadership of the two most powerful global collectives on earth - as BEING self-sophisticated arrogant and greedy to the extreme and DOING THE WRONG THINGS for the WRONG REASONS ?

So when your governments tell you how valuable our banking system is, and how important our financial services sector is, don’t believe them. Most of it is as valuable to our lives and as energetically parasitic as a Flu virus. For sure, we need old-fashioned banks who help us move money around, and take care of our savings. Possibly we need insurance companies to help us deal with life’s risks. Maybe there is even some sense in having companies which manage investments – if that process can be removed from the paper-casino it currently lives in and revert to supporting companies to buy plant and equipment, or cover their trading cycles. But a City of London filled with financial institutions generating huge fantasy debts which we, our children and our grandchildren are supposed to pay back?They’re not worth the paper they’re NOT written on.

" When plunder becomes a way of life for a group of men living together in society - they create for themselves, in the course of time, a legal system that authorises it and a moral code that glorifies it "

" The great fear is that the European Central Bank (ECB) will find it impossible to prop up the Italian bond market under its Outright Monetary Transactions (OMT) scheme if there is no coalition in Rome willing or able to comply with the tough conditions imposed by the EU at Berlin’s behest."

But we are not without hope. The problems that confront our planet and our humanity – environmental tension, social and family dysfunction, economic instability, and political unrest – give us an opportunity to pause, recognize, re-examine the sources of our suffering, and find a path that can lead us towards a brighter future and to an even brighter present.

This is the basic formula that the Buddha used during his own lifetime to guide his fellow beings to tend to their suffering. This basic formula can help guide us now, to our own salvation. The three distinctively Buddhist virtues of mindfulness, concentration, and insight can lead us to this salvation. Applied appropriately and skillfully, they can help us discover a global ethic and a mindful way of living that can guide the development of our society towards a more sane and healthy direction.

THE most important lesson that I learnt at Borehamwood Grammar School - was that which was delivered to me by my English Literature teacher call Mr. Wilkinson. When discussing the concept of critical analysis & appraisal, I said that there were obviously two directly opposed categories of criticism - constructive & destructive - to which he replied never ever apologise for offering constructive criticism- while all those around you perceive ALL criticism to be destructive.

... and as ALL of this CORPORATE self-serving manipulation continues to drive the, value for money seeking, people to the abyss - or should that be Aldi and Lidl - here we have the emperors clothes of TESCO torn away to reveal even the ineptitude of Warren Buffet's wise decision to invest in 7% of Tesco's business.

Leodardo da Vinci concluded towards the end of his life ... ALL is in NATURE - WE ARE a circumstance of NATURE

What the peoples of the world now require IS - "A needs-based economy or localisation,

in accordance with the law of Nature, as the ONLY remedy to the problems we face"

Many of us were raised by our parents to respect those who fought to ensure our freedom and taught that we should vote because the vote is the basis of our freedom. It is what separates us from tyrannies and dictatorships, the right to choose who or which political party represents you. It supposedly keeps the politicians on their toes and is a means of keeping checks and balances.

This is all well and good in a sovereign nation with little or no threat from transnational corporate behemoths, criminal central bankers or treasonous trade deals that ‘cannot be refused’. Without such intrusions, elected politicians could focus on what they believe is best for the nation and her people, the vote could possibly mean something and for many years, to some degree, it did.